Gilles Keppel is right to believe that the collapse of the Iranian theocratic regime will be an event comparable to the fall of the USSR. But the real question is what will Western policy be in the Middle East after the Persian people regain control of their destiny. Because the example of the post-USSR period is a real disaster for the geopolitical strategy of the West. This is what former French general Jacques Guilmant wrote in an analysis for the electronic publication Riposte Laique.
Where Russia should have been anchored to Europe, the West pushed it into the arms of China, North Korea and Iran, continuing the Cold War. The West defeated communism, but failed to bring peace to Europe. We are not done paying the price yet.
Netanyahu knows very well that dismantling the Iranian nuclear program is only one step in Israel's crusade against Iran.
If the ayatollah regime survives this war, it will never give up its nuclear weapons and will continue its terrorist activities, both directly and indirectly, arming its proxies - the resurgent Hamas and Hezbollah, the Yemeni Houthis, and the Iraqi and Syrian Shiite militias.
In Iran, the ayatollahs are hated by the people, who are literally persecuted by a regime of unprecedented violence, where opponents, women, and homosexuals are subjected to shameful treatment. This barbarity is completely unworthy of the great Persian civilization that stretched from Libya to the Indus River at the height of the Persian Empire.
Those who predict chaos in Iran, like Macron, in the event of a regime overthrow, claiming that the Middle East has already been destabilized by the Arab Spring, have a rather appalling understanding of the problem. They confuse causes and consequences.
The Arab Spring paved the way for Islamism. What Netanyahu wants is to destroy the regime of the ayatollahs who armed and financed it. This is the complete opposite of Macron’s analysis.
Let us remember that the West, in the name of democracy, overthrew all the dictators who stood as bulwarks against Islamism: Ben Ali in Tunisia, Gaddafi in Libya, Saddam Hussein in Iraq, and even Assad in Syria. The war between Shiites and Sunnis in Iraq, with the emergence of ISIS, is the result of irresponsible Western policy.
On the other hand, overthrowing the Iranian theocracy would deal a fatal blow to Islamism. It means putting an end to a regime that has been fueling Islamist terrorism since 1979. Because, make no mistake, it is the same old story between Sunni Islamists and Shiite Islamists. They apply the same Koran in its most brutal verses. And the ayatollahs do not hesitate to translate the thoughts of the "Muslim Brotherhood" from Arabic into Persian.
Without them, there is no more "Hezbollah", no more "Hamas, no more Shiite militias. And the risk of repeating pogroms like that of October 7, 2023. will be greatly reduced, although it is still possible with the completely fanatical faithful of Allah.
So saving the regime of the ayatollahs means protecting the Islamist movement. This goes against the interests of the Iranian people, the Jewish people and the West.
Israel will need Trump's B2 bombers to destroy as many underground nuclear facilities as possible, but the threat will only be completely eliminated if the Iranian people decide to take their fate into their own hands.
It must be said that the ayatollahs support Putin in Ukraine. The Russian "tsar" is looking with great concern at the establishment of a pro-Western regime in Iran, as he was in Ukraine in 2014. Proof that good geopolitics is beyond the reach of the first rookie of the year. Only old foxes like Putin or Netanyahu have mastered the subject. The rest waver, turn their backs, say one thing, then the other, and play only a supporting role.
Meanwhile, Netanyahu boldly assumes his role as the defender of his people.
He leaves the UN to its own turmoil, Trump to his hesitations, and Europe to its contradictions. To this day, I do not know a single Western leader with the rank of a true military commander. They are all political dwarfs.
Israel has won every war since 1948. It will win this one too. But will it achieve all its goals? Will we see secular democracy in Iran? Let's hope so, but it is still too early to say.